On Wednesday, March 19, the UFE Bargaining Team met with the administration’s representatives, Rod Younker, Walter Niemiec, Steve Trotter and Laurel Uznanski. Our agenda included deciding on rules and guidelines for our work together, setting a calendar for spring quarter and beyond, and hearing an initial response to the proposal we had presented on March 3.

Both parties agreed we must have an approach that will ensure productive sessions and show respect for the responsibilities of everyone at the table. We had little difficulty adopting rules and guidelines that promise this. As for the calendar,our next session will be on April 9, followed by two more on May 5 and 21. We agreed that after mid-May we might be ready to meet on a weekly basis. Initially, there is much to digest in the UFE’s comprehensive proposal, and meeting every other week in the immediate future will allow this.

In an overview of our negotiations, the administration agreed with UFE’s previously stated objective to seek an agreement that respects the principles, values, and practices distinctive to Evergreen. They thought this could best be accomplished through an approach that allows open-minded discussion before exchanging alternative written proposals. There are complicated questions about what should be addressed in our labor agreement, what in a revised Faculty Handbook, and what in College wide policies.

Following a caucus, we affirmed that we welcome the opportunity to work in an innovative way and keep in view the overall goal of how to preserve and enhance what we value most about Evergreen. We agreed there are important questions, without obvious answers, about what should and should not be in a negotiated agreement. While UFE represents all members of the faculty, we recognize there are important matters that fall to the responsibility of the entire faculty rather than to the UFE as its bargaining agent; indeed, one of our interests is to protect faculty-wide responsibilities.

We moved at this point to questions about specific articles in our contract proposal. Our task at this meeting was to understand the administration’s questions and the concerns that motivate them. We intend to identify and clarify our points of disagreement or agreement before we negotiate them.

UFE’S Bargaining Team again came well prepared. We worked with discipline, and we found that respect was shown from both sides of the table. We concluded the four hours with the sense that we had had a productive session. We left in agreement about the agenda for our next meetings.

*United Faculty of Washington State (WEA/AFT)